Do harmonised accounting standards lead to harmonised accounting practices? An empirical study of IAS 39 measurement requirements in some European Union countries

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to investigate the level of harmonisation for IAS 39 Financial Instruments: Recognition and Measurement and to identify if different levels of harmonisation are associated with company-specific factors. Based on Rahman et al. (2002), we used the Jaccard (JACC) index to determine the level of harmonisation between IAS 39 and the financial reporting practice of a broad-based sample of European-listed companies in 2005. We applied regression analysis to identify companies’ specific characteristics that affect the level of convergence of the reporting practice of financial instruments. The results of this study show a high level of harmonisation between accounting practices of European companies included in our sample and IAS 39.